Because I'm a Potato
by DM-sama
Summary: Chell finds the once goddess of Aperture Science being pecked away at by a loathsome crow. Android!GLaDOS


**~*Because I'm A Potato*~**

**By DM-sama**

With her feet stinging after the forceful launch from the orange portal Chell took a few seconds to regain her breath. It's been more time than she could calculate but she was almost certain she would never grow used to traveling through the unnatural tears in space that would usually flip her upside-down, much less jump into one and soar out the other like a bird. Not only was it completely unnatural but she was fairly sure she was developing a rash from it.

Cave Johnson was an intuitive, ambitious man that others might have admired and respected at some point, but his inventions made her feel like emptying her stomach of what contents it had left.

_I will never go skydiving, _she thought, massaging her temples. Loosening her shoulders she looked up at the massive panel a few feet above her head. Written in yellow letters was the blaring words _Control Room_, the one thing that Chell wanted to see right then. All she needed was to pull up the bridge and then she could catapult herself to the next room, where things were certainly going to bring about another raging headache. _They could rip up the time space continuum, yet they fail to create just one blasted elevator that led all the way to the top. Figures._

Upon entering the desecrated control room, Chell jumped back in fright when she heard a malevolent _caw _sound. Lifting up the ASHPD, a weight she had long since grown used to, Chell cautiously tiptoed around the perimeter of the room, her heart catching in her throat. While common sense told her that anything truly dangerous down here would have died a long time ago, her instincts (a good friend that has served her well these last few hours) told her that there was always a real reason for caution.

She paused again when she heard a light _peck-peck-peck_ing sound followed by multiple, pitiful cries of pain. Chell slowly approached the source of the sound and paused when she was met with the eyes of a large, frightful black crow. It's beady, soulless eyes were trained on her and she felt herself freeze in caution, trying to await the bird's next move.

"_While I admire the irony of you trying stare this bird to death_," a cold, robotic voice weakly called out from the massive nest, "_I would appreciate it if you could use what talents you have—ow!—and murder this bird for me._"

Figuring the worst it could do was nip at her fingers, Chell clumsily ran towards main office room. It worked for the most part; the bird was easily frightened off, cawing loudly as it flew away. She was certain that if the bird could speak English he would be cursing foully at her.

"_Thanks._"

Chell looked over the side of the nest's edge and cringed at the sight. GLaDOS, almost unnoticeable at first, was curled up in a small dent in the twigs and leaves, having attempted covering Herself in order to hide from the crow. It clearly hadn't worked. Her usual smooth-looking, white naked skin was smudged and caked with dirt, not to mention damaged entirely from the pecking of the bird, causing it to heavily leak oil. Her hair sprawled in disarray and fell pathetically over Her eyes, blocking them from view.

Suddenly the whole establishment began to tremble. Dirt fell from the ceiling and a couple of stray pens rolled off of the abandoned desks. Chell's immediate guess was an earthquake and had just been about to move to protect herself and cower under the desk. As quickly as it started however, it stopped, leaving her completely confused at what to do.

"_Just listen to what that moron is doing to my facility_," the little android hissed, not bothering to disguise the pure malice and disgust in Her tone. It was actually really weird, Chell was so used to Her pleasant mockery, she had forgotten how terribly angry She could get.

Feebly throwing back Her mud-caked, greasy hair, GLaDOS weakly looked up at Chell with an expression someone with lesser experience concerning robots might have mistaken for desperation. "_Look, I know we've had our differences in the past, but right now we both need each other. You need someone to disconnect that brain-dead idiot, and I need someone to pick me up. We're at an impasse."_

While Chell couldn't deny the logic of the statement it still didn't stop her hesitation and flat out reluctance. To actually _touch _that thing and carry her around? The same _thing _that had kept her prisoner and tortured her for so long. It caused the emotional side of her brain to get a little testy.

"_Unless you feel like implanting your own head onto the core transfer, a particularly painful process by the way, you're going to have to pick me up and take me with you." _Her yellow eyes were flashing and glowed for a second, before shutting off again. "_Ow…that was my emergency backup generator…I'm probably going to shut down any second now…_"

Swallowing her stubborn pride and the bad taste in her mouth, Chell gently reached out for the teensy android hiding in the bird's nest with her free hand. No matter how small and tender her movements it seemed that any contact with the robot sent the robot through a whirlwind of pain, if Her whines were anything to go by.

Of all the androids within Aperture Science that she had ever seen, Chell noticed that they all had one trait in common, the one thing that marked them as something other than human, and that was their brilliant eyes. She could distinctly remember the beautiful, baby-blue eyes of Wheatley that had nearly blinded her when they first met, or the Anger Core's fierce, bloody red eyes, and so forth.

GLaDOS, however, had had several deviations, things that would forever mark Her as _inhuman_, whether or not it was intentional. Her cybernetic skin was as pale as the full moon on a cloudless day and looked soft to the touch, while in reality it would probably burn your skin off. Her hair was pure white like snow, cropped at Her pointed, elf-like ears. The shape of Her body itself matched that of a seductive temptress. Despite all the other abnormalities, it was, like every other android, Her eyes that were the most distinctive, black, soulless scleras with burning yellow iris' that lacked pupils.

It was like She had been set to erase every human bit from Her hard drive, downright to her very appearance. It did the trick at least; She had all the appearance of a sugar-coated adder, like every bit of her personality, and just as deadly.

And now here she was, smaller than the palm of Chell's hand.

"_When that idiot disconnected me from the mainframe a lot of my initial programming's stopped working; I can't even think of a way for us to get out of here without shorting myself out. You won't believe how many times I blacked out while that monster was trying to eat me. How long was I down here?" _ Chell could suddenly feel the tiny little android shivering in her palms, and She tried curling up deeper into the warmth of Chell's hands.

Whether or not She was shivering from the slight chill in the air, or from stark fear, Chell couldn't tell. _Of course, here's a lady who was God to her own world, and now she's entirely dependent on a person who has every reason to want to kill her. The uncertainty must be agonizing. _

Chell felt richly satisfied.

"_There should be an external plug on the portal device, somewhere at the top. Plug me into it, it should give me some more energy volts._" Chell took her hand and gently sat the little android right on top of her device, watching as She crawled around, trying to find the outlet. It was vaguely fascinating, but also slightly disturbing. _If I ever see an android again once this was all over and done with, it'll be too soon. _That was assuming she'll make it out of there alive anyway.

"_Aha." _GLaDOS removed a tiny, completely unnoticeable panel on the portal device that revealed a small plug that She connected to some sort of port in the back of her neck. She lit up just a few knots more, like a light bulb. "_That's better. It helps, at least, I can now calculate the square root of—"_

It all happened quite suddenly. She had been in the middle of talking before she uttered a sudden _zrrt! _and slumped down onto the device, nearly falling onto the ground if Chell hadn't caught her. Lifting her hand closer to her face, fearing the worst, or maybe the best, she waited in baited breath.

With another distinctive _zzrt! _the android whirred back to life. She looked around in a panic. "_What happened? How long was I out?_" She met Chell's hardy gaze. "_Okay, so I guess I can't perform a basic math equation."_

_If there—if there's any chance you could put together some sort of clothe, that'd be great. My internal heater shut off too. It's freezing down here."_

Closing her hands around the android like a little butterfly Chell looked around the control room, trying to find some sort of clothe. There, in the corner far from prying eyes, looked a small brown potato bag. She walked over, disconnected the android from her portal device, and gently placed the shivering GLaDOS on the tabletop and ripped out a square of the bag. It felt horribly scratchy and foul to the touch, but Chell figured it would do.

Poking in two decent sized holes that would work for the arms she reemerged and handed over the impromptu outfit. The android quickly slid into it, wrapping it up with a seam as if though it were a belt, creating a raggedy gown. It reminded Chell of that Cinderella movie she had once watched in the Relaxation Center.

"_It smells horrible, but it'll do for now,_" said She. "_Put me on your shoulder, then you'll be able to hear me. Don't worry, I won't fall," _She reassured when Chell gave her a skeptical look._ "I'm literally a walking magnet, I can stick to you like a static sock. Sorry if I shock you at all, it's all we have to work with._"

Chell, not at all happy with the idea of having GLaDOS so close to her neck, reluctantly tossed Her onto her left shoulder. Suddenly a funny idea came to her just then, leaving Chell biting on her lip to keep from snickering.

"_All right, this should do fine, let's throw on the switch and—wait, what are you laughing at?"_

Chell snorted, pressing her lips tighter together to hold back her giggles, sure that GLaDOS won't appreciate the joke. It was fairly difficult, more difficult than she would have guessed considering she hadn't laughed since Wheatley had head butted that glass door, although that wasn't nearly as funny as now.

"_SWe're trapped hundreds of miles below the facility as a raging madman is slowly destroying everything around us and might cave the whole place in. _What _are you seeing that is so funny?_"

And so, it was with that one teensy, tiny question that Chell decided to break her one, sacred rule, to never talk to GLaDOS, to never give that horrible monster the satisfaction of hearing her talk. Chell snickered and snorted, trying to collect herself, before uttering the one word.

"PotatOS."

Silence.

Chell screeched in pain when an electric shock ran down her left arm and completely numbed it out.

"_I'm not sorry for that._"

**~*O*~**

Sorry if this seems _extremely _lame, but I was really in the mood to make an android Portal 2 ficlet of late, it was just such an interesting concept. You can blame all the humanoid pictures of DeviantArt, and _especially _that Blue Sky story. Man, but have I never wanted a sequel more badly…

Speaking of which, I want to make another one-shot with Wheatley in it later, but for now I'm just happy that I managed to get this finished. I'm terrible with finishing things. Keep a weather eye on the horizon, though!

~DM-sama


End file.
